Chinese · Pronunciation Guide

How do you pronounce "矮" in Chinese?

Q: How do you pronounce 矮 in Chinese?

矮 is pronounced with the stress described below. In IPA it is written /aɪ˨˩˦/. It means “short (in height) / low.” Like the word "eye" sunk to the bottom of your voice. No consonant at all — just a wide diphthong and a low sagging pitch.

Like the word "eye" sunk to the bottom of your voice. No consonant at all — just a wide diphthong and a low sagging pitch.

矮 /aɪ˨˩˦/

ǎi

Everything depends on what comes next: before another dipping syllable it rises, otherwise it stays low. Because it begins with a bare vowel, it also tends to run into whatever precedes it, and a slight separation is usually needed to keep the syllable boundary clear — the same issue that 爱 ài has.

Listen: 矮

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Sound it out

ai Wide open on "ah" with the jaw genuinely down, then closing toward "ee". The opening position is more open than in the English word "eye".

ǎi (dip) Low and heavy throughout, with the small final upturn appearing only when the word stands alone. With no consonant to launch the syllable, the low pitch has to be established from the very first instant.

Hear it in a sentence

这张桌子很矮。

Zhè zhāng zhuōzi hěn ǎi.

This table is very low.

Listen: 这张桌子很矮。

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这张桌子很矮。 ends on ǎi, so the dipping tone gets its full contour with room for the final lift. Before it, hěn is adjacent to ǎi and both are third tones, so hěn rises: hén ǎi. The sentence therefore closes with a climb into a sag, which is exactly the shape learners flatten into two mid-level syllables.

Where English speakers slip

Letting the pitch fall rather than dip drifts toward 爱 ài — so "short" comes out sounding like "love", with only the vowel-initial shape shared. A third tone starts low and stays low; a fourth starts high. The other issue is inserting a hard glottal stop or an "h" at the front, because English is uncomfortable beginning a word with a bare vowel.